City Needs To Avoid A Collision Course

As the deadline nears for adoption of a city budget, a flap about on-street parking, of all things, has the Spokane City Council driving in circles around the block.

Actually, downtown parking is an issue important to the city center’s health. Not because there’s a dire lack of it; there isn’t. Parking in downtown’s garages is convenient, abundant, safe, and free for shoppers who take advantage of the merchant-supported Easy Pass program.

Rather, downtown parking is important because there is a perception it’s inadequate. And when it comes to the willingness of people to come to the core, enjoy its attractions and support its businesses, perceptions make a real difference.

Therefore it is a good idea to keep working on the downtown parking system.

City officials already have taken a huge step forward, by approving the garage expansion included in the River Park Square retail project, due to open next year.

Now, city officials are eyeing the on-street parking meters. They’ve been debating fines, meter rates and parallel-vs.-diagonal parking configurations. The principal reason for this discussion is the city’s budget crunch.

As decision time nears, it’s important to focus on one overriding consideration: keeping the core healthy, hospitable both to cars and pedestrians, a center for community celebrations and identity, a place people always will want to visit. All over the country, cities that neglected this priority watched their costs rise and revenues fall as their downtowns slid into crime, tax-base decay and social dysfunction. No way will that happen here, if Spokane stays on course with the many projects now under way, from housing to retail to education.

It is appropriate, of course, for city officials to be looking at the amount of money parking meters contribute to the budget. They’re in a tight, transitional budget year. City operating costs are soaring. Tax revenues won’t rise very much until late in 1999 when the new retail project opens. A boost in parking meter revenue would help balance the budget.

Higher parking fines and meter rates, of course, aren’t popular. So, city officials have started talking about converting some of downtown’s on-street parking spaces from parallel parking to diagonal parking.

This would increase the number of spaces, raising revenues and addressing the perception there’s not enough convenient parking. Motorists consider it easier to drive into a diagonal spot. Elsewhere in Spokane - at Carnegie Square - diagonal parking has helped improve customer access to a popular, restored commercial district.

However, there are disadvantages that make it wise to approach this concept with caution: If you’re parked in a diagonal spot next to a minivan or sport utility vehicle, you can’t see what’s coming when you back out. If you’re backing onto one of downtown’s busier streets, you risk a rear-end collision.

This doesn’t rule out diagonal parking, which ought to be given a try. However, diagonal slots ought to be limited to quieter streets, and the experiment ought to be reviewed later next year. If a prudent number of diagonal slots will not produce sufficient revenue, the city may have to add to its budget compromise a modest increase in meter rates, which in fact are below those in comparable cities.

All of us need to keep this little tempest in perspective. A much larger increase in revenue, from on-street parking fees, sales taxes, property taxes and business license fees - will occur as development and trade bring fresh vigor to the heart of our community.